Monday, June 30, 2014

Day 24: A World Too Wide

This design was the first to develop when I added the traditional quilt squares to my original learning/geometric squares. After my friend Julia ﻿pointed out how the spiral square was similar to the Snails Trail quilt block, I went home and remade the square so new colors start at the center of each side of the square, rather than coming from the corners.

I decided the easiest way to get smooth lines was to run threads through the surface of the stitches on the original square, and make adjustments as I went. I started the threads from the center out and was thrilled to find that I could make even more of a spiral than I had before with just a few small changes.

I began searching online for examples of quilts using the "Snails Trail" block. There are various ways of combining the squares to create completely different looks. But I liked this one where the corner colors match up to create a sea of spiral stars. ﻿

When I envisioned this afghan, I wanted warm, southwestern-type colors, trying to break away from the cool blues and greens I tend to go for. The Brown Sheep Cotton Fleece was perfect because they have SO many different colors to choose from. I started off with these 8 colors I picked up at TNNA, and studied the Brown Sheep website, and went in to a couple LYSs that carries a lot of their yarn colors to choose the additional colors.

Using the above quilt (found on The Quilt Index.org) as my inspiration, I actually made 6 strips of 6 squares each. But by the time I started whip-stitching them together, I realized the blanket would be more than big enough with just 5 strips. That 6th strip will make a perfect scarf to wear this fall, and show off the technique.

2 comments:

Thank you! Yes! The top photo is one from the book. This is certainly one of my favorites too. I would suggest making a practice block as you learn all the tricks to working the technique in double crochet. But this one block uses them all. So great practice!

About Me

Crochet Designer, Instructor, and Author. Professional member of CGOA and TNNA. My children are my muses, inspiring many of my designs. This blog began with our NICU blanket project, donating in memory of my first daughter. Over time it has become about all things crochet, my designs, and crafting with my kids.
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